Shark Finning

David McGuire of Shark Stewards gives his account of the state of the shark nation and insight into the diabolical shark finning trade. It's great to have personal accounts of the real animal in its element, the open ocean.

Sharks of all species are doomed unless action is taken now to stop the fin trade and Chinese demand for shark fin soup. All shark species are subjected to the ancient but increasing habits of certain Chinese restaurateurs.

Celebrities and conservation organisations are working together to call for an end to the production of shark fin soup. A California Assembly Bill (AB 376) deals with this matter. It will ban all trade and import of shark fin in California. It is only lacking Governor Jerry Brown's signature before it can be made law.

An anti-shark finning group is appalled at the mutilation of baby sharks discovered on New Zealand's beaches this week. Two people came across around 200 finless baby sharks washed up at Owhanake Bay, Waiheke Island, which is one of the many islands in Auckland's Hauraki Gulf.

Chile has banned the practice of shark-finning which costs up to 73 million sharks their lives each year. Shark fins are usually sold to the Far East, where they are made into shark fin soup. The toll on some of the ocean's biggest and baddest predators can be terrible - they are often de-finned before being dumped, still alive, back into the sea.

Shark Finning: When those aiming to save the shark are up against bloody trade making big money, seas and fisheries that are not policed and a community wanting to defend its cultural heritage, how can they win the battle? By turning the shark fin soup bowl into a dining room outcast.

The city of Brantford, Ontario, has captured the attention of the world by becoming the first city in Canada to call a halt to the trade in shark fins. The World Wildlife Fund estimates that around 73 million sharks are killed every year, mostly for their fins. The majority of the fins are taken using barbaric methods where the shark is thrown back into the ocean alive and without its fin.

The state of Sabah in Malaysia is likely to be the first in the country to introduce a ban on shark hunting for their fins. Shark finning is a lucrative industry as many countries enjoy it as a delicacy but has recently caught the attention of the world and now the Sabah state government is concerned that the barbaric slaughter of sharks for their fins is damaging their tourism industry.

Scientists are now able to track where shark fins have originated from through their DNA. The finding that sharks have DNA 'zip codes' means that the fight against the shark fin trade is strengthened as scientists can work out what region sharks where born in. Whilst sharks tend to have a wide habitat in which they live they are connected to the coastal regions where they always go to reproduce.

Shark finning, the horrific practice of cutting off the fins of sharks, and then dumping them still alive into the sea to die, is being pushed back by a new bill going through the Chilean Senate. The measure, which would help stop the wasteful slaughter of increasingly endangered sharks, is being supported by a visiting Pew Environment Group team.

Endangered Great hammerhead sharks have been tracked by satellite into the North Atlantic for the first time by scientists at the University of Miami. The animals are under threat from shark finning operations who prize them for their large fins.

An average of five humans have been killed by sharks each year since 2000, yet every year we kill up to 75 million sharks for their fins, used in Chinese shark's fin soup, and as bycatch in our fisheries. Shark finning has expanded globally due to rising demand by affluent Chinese for the high status shark fin soup. Retailing at about US$ 430/kg in Hong Kong the trade is a lucrative one for fishermen. Finning is inhumane and cruel in the extreme.

Large, oceangoing fish like the shark have been in steady decline for years, victims of poor regulation and overfishing by big industrial fleets. But now some reprive seems to be in sight thanks to a US law. The US Congress approved a bill prohibiting shark finning in all United States waters.

In a bold move, the Senate of the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands has voted to prohibit all shark finning in its waters. Sharks living in the ocean around the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands (CNMI) have suffered from intense overfishing and poaching for their valuable fins. Sharks in particular are vulnerable to illegal fishing because, as a species, they reproduce very slowly.

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